Blog – Crackpot Studioshttp://crackpot.studio
Turning Imagination to CreationMon, 03 Dec 2018 09:53:58 +0000en-UShourly1https://wordpress.org/?v=4.9.9https://i1.wp.com/crackpot.studio/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/cropped-Big.png?fit=32%2C32Blog – Crackpot Studioshttp://crackpot.studio
3232145245443Holidays, Headaches and Hyperactivityhttp://crackpot.studio/2018/10/08/holidays-headaches-and-hyperactivity/
http://crackpot.studio/2018/10/08/holidays-headaches-and-hyperactivity/#respondMon, 08 Oct 2018 10:51:17 +0000http://crackpot.studio/?p=391It’s obviously been several weeks (nearly two months!) since my last update. So much for that three month string of weekly posts! No deep or hidden reason – work got busy, we were preparing to go away on a family holiday, and I just didn’t have enough time to work on anything. In fact, we’re still away as I write this post.

But… I’m back now. And it turns out I have some serious work ahead of me.

You see, a few weeks ago there was an announcement – PAX Collaboratory is a new feature at PAX this year, helping to bring attention and support to local game designers and their projects. In a fit of misguided self confidence, I submitted Bounty – a project that I haven’t even posted about here outside of my initial brain-dump of active development ideas when I put the Projects page together.

Today, I received an email, and for some reason the Powers that Be accepted my submission.

Here’s a sequence of events as they occurred:

Eat a picnic lunch on the grounds of the Australian War Memorial with the family (It’s gorgeous and humbling and so many other emotions. If you’ve never been, go.)

Idly pass off the fact that I hadn’t received an email, because I truly wasn’t expecting to.

Realise my email only refreshes every hour, and people have only been posting for the last 25 minutes.

Check my email – yep, there it is. That’s no doubt the “thanks, but no…” email.

Open the email.

Choke on my salad a little when I see that there are times allocated.

Realise how utterly unprepared I am.

Tunnel vision a little as my brain shuts down non-essential processes such as vision. Was it lack of air from the choking on the salad? Or was my brain diverting all spare CPU cycles to timeframes, project development, and planning? Pft, who needs vision anyway?

Hyperventilate as I manage to dislodge the salad.

Catch my breath, and tell the family the good news.

I don’t think I can stress enough how much I have to do, keeping in mind that as of right now, PAX is only 2.5 weeks away.

I guess I better get off here and get back to work, otherwise nothing will get done at all! Check back for details about Bounty Real Soon Now ™, and I hope to see some of you at PAX in Melbourne, 26-28 October!tface

To make up for it, feast your eyes and ears on this marvellous modern take on an old classic.

]]>http://crackpot.studio/2018/08/17/not-an-update/feed/0373Pathfinder Playtest – First Thoughtshttp://crackpot.studio/2018/08/10/pathfinder-playtest-first-thoughts/
http://crackpot.studio/2018/08/10/pathfinder-playtest-first-thoughts/#respondFri, 10 Aug 2018 05:42:38 +0000https://crackpot.studio/?p=369I’m currently on a flight from Perth to Adelaide, after spending the whole week away for work. So not only has there been no game design to speak of this week, I’m also typing this article on my phone, with no internet access. As a result, it’s not going to be chock-full of lovely pictures or interesting links. In exchange, I offer you what is no doubt a bevy of typos, poor grammar and shitty sentence structure. Sound fair? Good.

Which is a shame, because this week is also the first full week after the release of the Pathfinder Playtest. I’d love to be able to link you to the rules, the Paizo forums, and some of the Facebook discussions happening, but you’ll simply have to a) go without, or b) seek them out yourself – sorry!

Those who play Pathfinder are probably aware that after 10 years of product releases, Paizo are moving towards Pathfinder 2nd Edition. The public playtest was released in conjunction with GenCon (2nd August from memory – no internet to double check at the moment, remember?) and will be running for several months before an intended official release of the final rules at the same time in 2019.

Since the release (10:30 Thursday night local time) I’ve done very little as far as leisure time goes except read the rules, attempt to build a few characters, and familiarise myself with the provided Playtest adventure Doomsday Dawn. Because not only am I personally excited by the changes, but our local RPG group is having our first Playtest session tomorrow night. I tell you what, it’s a good thing no one else is particularly familiar with the rules, because I sure don’t feel ready to run it as GameMaster!

If you’re a Pathfinder tragic like I am, you’re probably very familiar with some of the major changes. If you’re not, then this is what this article is for – a really brief intro to some concepts, and perhaps some personal thoughts. (plus, I’m going to direct my players to this article, to save me explaining some things tomorrow night). So, onwards!

Three Action Economy

Let’s start with one of the biiig changes. The traditional Move, Standard, Free and possibly Swift action have been turned on their head. Now, characters get three Actions and one Reaction. Free actions still exist though.

A single Action can be used to move up to your speed, to take a careful 5-foot step, to swing a weapon, to open a door etc. Pretty straight forward.

Each component (Verbal, Somatic, Material) of a spell takes an action. Yes, this now means you can potentially cast multiple spells in a single round.

And if Casters can get multiple spells, I suppose it’s only fair if martial get multiple attacks. And so they do. A second attack is at a -5 penalty, and a third at -10 from memory. These negatives are a huge deal – the section below on Critical Success and Critical Failure.

A Reaction is used someone else’s turn in resonse to a trigger of some kind. The simplest example is an Attack of Opportunity, which works more-or-less in the familiar manner except that it is now only available to Fighters. There are several other examples of Reactions in the rulebook, but you’ll have to take a look at them yourself.

This is a big, big change. There are now lots of options for movement on the battlefield. You don’t need to simply move into position and hold that space to get your huge damage output with multiple attacks. I’m looking forward to seeing how this works in practice.

Races are now Ancestries

This is not a drastic change overall – the obvious Human, Elf, Dwarf etc are still present. It’s more of a terminology change. The obvious difference here is the inclusion of Goblins as a core playable race. There’s lots of scuttlebutt on the internet about how a goblin PC will destroy the integrity of the game and cause nothing but issues within the party. My personal view is this – “quit complaining and be a responsible player or GM.” Any character concept can cause issues in a party. Players ang GM’s alike need to work together to make sure your Goblin PC has a reason to work with the Longshanks and not to set fire to them on their sleep. As PCs you’re already highly unusual in the world. Find a reason for that goblin to have left her tribe. This is a game about imagination, as much as anything else.

Uh, sorry. Rant over.

Currently this is not part of the Playtest rules, but theoretically this allows a human from Cheliax to potentially have mechanical differences to one hailing from Varisia. This could sort of happen previously with Traits, but Traits are gone. Partially rolled into the Ancestry selections, and partly into…

Backgrounds

Backgrounds attempt to embed the Roleplay aspect with Mechanics. Not everyone is thrilled with this, but I think it’s a great idea. You now choose from one of approximately 20 backgrounds at character creation (think Blacksmith, Nomad, Butcher etc) which gives you some specific Attribute score bonuses as well as a specific Lore skill. Speaking of attribute bonuses…

Generating Attributes is now different, too.

If. You’ve played Starfinder, it should be pretty familiar to you. All Attributes start at 10. Your Ancestry gives you 1x +2 bonus to a specific Attribute, 1x -2 drawback, and a free choice +2 which can be used to offset your negative if you choose. Then your background gives you +2 to a specific Attribute, and another +2 free choice. Your Class gives a +2 to its key Attribute (eg, Wisdom for Clerics and either Strength of Dexterity for Fighters). Finally, you get 4x +2 free choices, which must all be spent on different Attributes.

The point-buy method is officially dead, although the rules do include optional rules for Rolling for Stats. This means there is no mechanical benefit to “dumping” a stat.

It feels odd to not have odd scores (see what I did there?) but I’m not sure it’s going to have a negative effect in play. Overall, I like this process. It makes character creation quite organic.

Classes

In the playtest you really only have the “traditional” classes. Which should only be expected given that there is a limit to the material that could possibly be added to a Playtest document. What is interesting though is the inclusion of the Alchemist as a core class. This class was released for OG Pathfinder in the Advanced Class Guide (maybe…? No damn internet!)

I don’t have a whole lot to comment on with regard to specific classes. Except to note that straightforward Multiclassing is no longer present. Instead you need to take a Dedication Feat to gain access to the feats of a second class (more on Feats later). On paper I like this idea. But I can’t get a good feel for how it will work on practice until 8 actually try it out.

Skills

The skill list has been compressed significantly. Along with this reduction, skill points have been thrown out. Now a character is trained in a certain number of skills based on their Intelligence and Class, with the specific bonus coming from their degree of Proficiency in said skill. More on Proficiency later. Overall this is going to be a change that feels very different, but my musings over the last week have left me pretty comfortable overall – especially as it all ties into the Critical Success and Critical Failure sections, also discussed shortly.

Feats

Oh my, there are so many feats. General Feats can be taken by anyone. Skill Feats affect the things you can actually attempt to do with your skills. Class Feats are locked behind a gate requiring yo Ito be a member of that class to take them (intended to keep classes different to each other, while allowing flexibility in how your character progresses). Ancestry Feats (I feel my terminology is wrong, but again… no damn internet!) provide bonuses based on your heritage.

I feel like there is room for some confusion here, but by making everything a Feat, it allows a much greater degree of flexibility from one character to another. Not every Rogue or Monk needs to be the same as every other Rogue or Monk.

Different types of Feats are gained at different rates for different Classes. It’s spelled out reasonably lesrly in each Class entry in the rulebook.

Proficiency

Most everything is now associated with a Proficiency level. Your ability with different types of weapons and armour, your use of skills and even your saving throws all add your Proficiency score.

Your Proficiency score is equal to your Level, plus a variable bonus:

-2 if you are Untrained

+0 for Trained characters

+1 for an Expert character

+2 as a Master

+3 for the rare Legendary character.

The difference in bonuses (-2 to +3) doesn’t sound huge, but I feel that the effect is going to be bigger than it seems at first glance when you consider that you also add your level, and there is something called…

Critical Success and Critical Failure

Proficiency initially seems very boring… If all characters are adding their level to most of their rolls, then why bother? Just leave it out and add just your Bonus (trained, expert etc). What this argument doesn’t consider is that it will help to keep higher level encounters challenging, and lower level encounters simple. If the characters are 3 levels lower than the opponent, then the difference in rolls is going to average out to +3 against the PCs. This should help keep rolls comparatively close together, allowing Critical Success and Critical Failures to shine.

In short, success and failure is simply a hit and a miss, respectively. But if you succeed by 10 or more, or fail by 10 or more, that’s a Critical Success or a Critical Failure.

I’m not going to go into the effects of Criticals (I can’t double check them without internet…) but if the difference between a Hit and a Critical Hit is just 10,then the difference in Level between the characters, as well as the (relatively small) Proficiency Bonuses is probably going to have a big effect.

I really like this. It still needs to be tested out in game, but it’s one of my favourite new parts of the game. In theory.

Resonance Points

From all the outrage on the internet, it’s pretty safe to say this is one of the most controversial changes.

All characters have a pool of Resonance equal to Level + CHA mod (or INT for some reason if you’re an Alchemist).

Every time (more or less – there are some exceptions) you use a consumable magic item, or once for every “permanent” magic item you put on during your daily preparations, you spend a pool of Resonance to activate that magic.

If your Resonance is reduced to zero, you can still attempt to use the item – you just need to roll a flat d20 and compare the result to 10 plus the number of Resonance Points you have “overspent” so far for the day. If you pass, you use the item with no problem. If you fail, that charge/use is wasted. If you CRITICALLY fail, you’re cut off from new magic for the rest of the day. Any “permanent” items you’ve already activated are still in effect, though.

Paizo have given two reasons for this change:

It reduces the spamming of wands of Cure Light Wounds.

It prevents Charisma being routinely used as a dump stat.

From those perspectives, it works. But I’m certainly not sold on it being a good solution, and I’m certainly not alone in that thought. However, unlike many other opinions on the internet, I’m willing to give it a go. Everything else in the rules sounds like it should more or less work, and I can’t see such a major issue making its way though to public testing if it’s utterly broken.

And that’s it – my thumbs are cramping up doing all this on my phone, so it’s all you’re getting!

If you’re one of my players tomorrow night, please make sure you’ve read through this. And if you’re not, then hopefully you’re not already sick of random people’s opinions on the Playtest rules!

Until next time,

Yours in Adventure,

Shane

]]>http://crackpot.studio/2018/08/10/pathfinder-playtest-first-thoughts/feed/0369Keeping In Touchhttp://crackpot.studio/2018/08/03/keeping-in-touch/
http://crackpot.studio/2018/08/03/keeping-in-touch/#respondFri, 03 Aug 2018 08:15:47 +0000http://crackpot.studio/?p=362I’ve mentioned in the past that I’ve only got a quick update for you, but it tends to balloon out really quickly. But this week, I mean it! There’s now two ways you can make sure you keep up with the latest articles:

Firstly, you could sign up for a weekly email. There’s also a handy link right up there at the top of the page. I’ve managed to convince a horde of monkeys to stuff electronic envelopes for me, and send them out to you.

The second possibility is RSS. That’s right, there are still some of us (me, at least!) in the world who use RSS to keep up with our news sources. Just use this link in your RSS Reader of choice to subscribe.

Neither of these are going to overload your inbox or feed reader. Updates only occur when I publish a new article, and I’m having trouble staying on top of just a weekly article as it is. However, unsubscribing to either is just as simple, so you’ve really got nothing to lose – give it a go!

I’ll also try to include links at the bottom of future articles to these two channels. But you should know me by now – I’m not all that organised. It’s nothing short of a minor miracle that I’m keeping up with weekly articles as it is!

But that’s it for this week. Really!

Next week I’m away for work, so I really have no idea how I’ll go scheduling-wise. But at least now you know two different ways to make sure you keep in the loop

Until then,

Yours in Adventure,

Shane.

]]>http://crackpot.studio/2018/08/03/keeping-in-touch/feed/0362Skirmish: Week in Reviewhttp://crackpot.studio/2018/07/27/skirmish-week-in-review/
http://crackpot.studio/2018/07/27/skirmish-week-in-review/#respondFri, 27 Jul 2018 09:15:11 +0000http://crackpot.studio/?p=341In the last week, we’ve had at least a dozen games of Skirmish, spread across four players (aged 6, 9, 15 and, uh… ‘adult’), with varying versions of the rules.

What’s been especially encouraging is that the two smallest playtesters have gone back for multiple games between themselves entirely of their own accord. When one of my goals was to take the combat elements of an RPG and simplify it to play with my kids, then I’d say that’s already a success!

Check out some of our action shots. Don’t forget to click/tap on the image for a hi-res version.

Last week I mentioned that there were still several areas that needed work (and when I say work, I really mean “creating from scratch because I haven’t gotten there yet”):

Scaling/climbing terrain (cliffs, hillsides etc)

Swimming/water

Cover against attacks

Bonuses for attacking from high ground

Expanding the Equipment and Abilities list.

I’m happy to say that most of these have been straightforward rules additions, and four out of five are now workable. Of course, the Equipment and Abilities list is still outstanding, and due to the piecemeal nature of it is likely to be in a permanent state of flux. The rest, though, have been tested a few times and seem to be working reasonably well.

A couple of these points have required a new concept – that of a “Step”. A Step is a change in level on the battlefield from one Hex to another. I’m using my HexTerra terrain for this, with the files provided in 10mm height intervals. So a fairly simple conversion is 10mm – 1 Step. Pretty straightforward overall.

Climbing and Descending

Climbing/Descending terrain is simply done at an increased cost for Steps of 1 to 2 above/below your current level.

Going up or down one step costs one Action point, in addition to the “base” Action needed to move.

Two steps is two Action points (plus the base Action to move).

Moving up or down three or more steps requires you to spend three Action points total, and make a 1d6 roll, adding the lower of your Strength/Power or Dexterity/Speed bonuses. If you roll equal to or greater than the number of “Steps” you’re attempting to climb, you succeed. If you roll lower than the number of Steps, you fail. A fail when Climbing/Ascending simply means you don’t move, but you’ve still spent those three Actions. A fail when Descending means you fall, and take 1d6 of Damage.

Swimming

Swimming requires two Actions whenever you enter a Water hex. A Character cannot attack while in the water, and any bonus to their defence is halved, rounded down.

Additionally, you cannot spend points on moving or attacking with other Characters while there is a Character in the water. They must leave the water before you can do anything else, even if this takes multiple turns.

Cover

Cover is provided by different types of terrain, and comes in two types – Hard Cover, through which an attack cannot be made, and Soft Cover, which imparts a -4 penalty on any attack made.

Draw a straight line from the centre of your Hex to the centre of the target Hex. If the line passes through any part of a Hex containing Cover, then apply the relevant penalty above.

Hard Cover exists when there is a permanent structure (such as a building) or a “bump” in the landscape of 3 or more Steps.

Soft Cover includes pretty much anything else, including rocks, trees, other Characters etc.

High Ground

High Ground provides different bonuses, depending on whether you are making a Melee or Ranged attack.

Melee combatants receive a +1 bonus to both attacks and defence against opponents 1-2 Steps lower than them (It’s hard to strike uphill, or to defend against attacks coming from above). No Melee attack can be made where there is a Step difference of 3 or more (30mm in a 28mm-scale game – roughly 6 feet).

Ranged attacks gain +1 Range for every three Steps they are above their target.

Other Changes

Some of the other modifications I’ve been playing with include (briefly):

Implementing the card-based Action Selection at the start of rounds, instead of dice. This seems to be working really well.

Changing the points required for various bonuses. Eg, I’ve swapped the point requirements of Melee and Ranged bonuses in an attempt to drive more Melee combat instead of relying on Ranged attacks.

Lowering the cost of bonuses across the board, and allowing Offensive and Defensive bonuses to be purchased separately. This should allow for a wider range of customisation, without overly complicating things (I hope…)

So far, things are working really, really well. I’m still thoroughly entertained when I play, and the kids are capable of playing on their own. That’s two of my big design goals right there. In fact, even the 6 year old knows all these rules well enough that I only need to help him with his maths, not with character creation, attacking, defending etc. He can play perfectly fine on his own.

What I still need to work on – but honestly think it will just come with time – is the “RPG Combat” feeling. I suspect this is mostly going to be addressed through the various combinations of Equipment and Abilities, so I’ll just keep plugging away at expanding the list slowly.

That’s all for this week – I’m slowly getting all this put together into a not-very-pretty-but-hopefully-usable rulebook. With any luck I’ll be able to get something functional out to you all soon, and you can give it a go yourselves and provide some feedback!

Yes, I have trouble focussing on one task. Yes, I promise one day I’ll finish a project I’ve already started. No, I haven’t discarded any of my previous projects in disgust and/or frustration. Rather, I just started pondering a few different trains of though:

I need to work on the d3RPG combat mechanics a bit, but given the effort that goes into writing a whole RPG system from scratch, I wanted the chance to experiment with something else first. It would be a shame if the combat system didn’t hold up under the load purely because I hadn’t played with enough different ideas first.

My kids (6 and 9) desperately want to play Pathfinder with me. Somehow I get the feeling that they’re more interested in the hack-and-slash than the political intrigue and shades of moral grey roleplaying though. Pathfinder is a rather complex system, so how can I simplify and focus on the combat so the kids can have fun?

After designing and printing a heap of HexTerra tiles, I wanted an excuse to use them. I have another early game design that I never mentioned on the blog (no big secret – it just slipped my mind) that could be expanded to incorporate the HexTerra system. Why not play around with that a bit?

And so was born Skirmish – a totally thoroughly thought-out name that wasn’t invented literally as I was writing this piece after realising I needed to call it something. Yep, definitely.

Skirmish is a tactical miniatures game where two players duke it out on a hex-based map, using a small party of customised adventurers.

Yeah, I like the sound of that. In fact, early playtesting with the kids shows it’s already quite fun and has a lot of potential. However, it’s been a super-busy week, and I only started working on this a few days ago. As a result I’m really only going to be giving you the most cursory overview of how things currently work.

Setup

Start with a hex map. Here’s one I created for the purpose, sized to A1 paper at 200dpi. This is something you’re probably going to want to get printed at your local print shop. Feel free to use it for literally anything you want.

Throw some terrain down. Shameless plug: HexTerra works really well for this. Of course you could use any type of terrain you like – it doesn’t need to specifically be hex-based.

Get some miniatures. The map and terrain I’m using are based on a 28mm miniature assumption, but you could use any scale you like. In fact, you can use any sort of miniatures you have already lying around. No need to buy specific stuff!

Build your party of adventurers using pre-determined rules. The framework for this will be covered under “Creating an Adventurer”. Take inspiration from the minis you happen to be using – it makes it much more thematic.

Toss your dudes on a map, and fight!

Play

Determine the number of Actions available for the round, and which player goes first. I’m currently experimenting with both a dice-based and card-based variant of this Action determination. The cards are currently winning, and have the potential for some cool effects in a future iteration of the game.

The first player uses the allotment of Actions for the round on a combination of Movement, Melee and Ranged attacks, Magical assaults, and activating Equipment or Abilities.

Move one hex for one point

Make a Melee or Ranged attack for two points

Throw some Magic out there for three points

Use your Equipment or special Abilities for however many points are listed against the relevant Unit.

The second player then does the same, before returning to Step 1 and determining a whole new number of Actions for the next round.

Continue until the game ends. Currently this is a simple annihilation scenario, but there’s no theoretical reason why Capture the Flag, Take-and-Hold or something else wouldn’t work as a victory condition as well.

Creating an Adventurer

Each player should have a team built on the same foundation – select a total number of Points to build towards (and possibly total number of Units), and get cracking! There are three main steps, which can be completed in any order.

Purchase your Attributes (Strength, Dexterity, Magic, and Resilience). The first three Attributes assist with different types of attacks, while Resilience provides Health, helping the unit last longer in a fight. Each of these Attributes cost a different amount, and may scale differently as more points are spent. Testing continues…

Select which Equipment your Unit will be provided with. Each piece of Equipment will be priced individually. This equipment may provide an edge in certain circumstances (eg, When you score a hit, deal a minimum of 3 points of damage) or provide a benefit that may be used at any time (eg, heal 2d6 damage, usable twice only). This is a potentially endless list that could be expanded over and over and over and over….

Pick your Abilities which make each unit stand out from the others. Perhaps you will get a bonus when you and your ally are flanking an opponent. Maybe you provide great leadership, giving your allies a +1 bonus to attacks within a certain range when you activate your Rallying Cry (aka – spend points to do so!). What about allowing your friends to share their pain with you, splitting damage they take between the two of you? If you’ve played RPGs before, you should definitely feel some familiarity with some of these Abilities. Again, these abilities are individually priced and could be eternally expanded.

Eventually, you’ll run out of points, and your character building is done. It’s quite similar to the current state of d3RPG, really. It shouldn’t be surprising that my ideas tend to bleed one into the other.

With enough Equipment and Ability options, there should be plenty of different character builds possible. The challenge is to actually write them up!

So it’s all based on Attacking… How does that work?

Glad you asked!

Different types of attacks are based on different character attributes or scores – much like an RPG:

Melee attacks are Strength based

Ranged attacks are Dexterity based

Magic attacks are….. Magic based.

Rather than using a static Target or Armour Class, attacking and defending are made by opposed rolls. Defending against each of these attacks is assisted by the same attribute – Strength defends against Melee attacks, etc.

When attacking, roll 3d6, add your attribute bonus, and any other situational bonuses from Equipment or Abilities. When defending, you add the same bonuses, but you only roll 2d6.

When Attack > Defense, that’s a hit. The unit takes damage equal to the difference. (eg, an Attack of 17 vs Defense of 13 results in 4 damage to the defending unit).

When a single adventurer (or unit… I’m no especially good at keeping my terminology straight) hits 0 health, they are removed from the game.

In general, equally matched opponents will usually score a hit, but there is approximately a 20% chance that the attack will miss. If you are much better equipped for a certain type of attack than your opponent is equipped to defend against it, that chance goes down, and vice versa.

What Happens Now?

I’ve played enough games to be confident that the basic 3d6 v 2d6 mechanic is sound, so now I need to work on incorporating some additional rules, then testing, testing, testing them until they inevitably break:

Scaling/climbing terrain (cliffs, hillsides etc)

Swimming/water

Cover against attacks

Bonuses for attacking from high ground

And of course, never-ending expansion of the Equipment and Abilities list.

There’s bound to be plenty more that I haven’t even thought of, but I’ll address it all as it comes up I suppose. The kids are very enthusiastic to play (which really was the main thrust to it all) so this is one project that I don’t have to worry about where my playtesters are coming from!

As a reward for getting all the way to the end, I’m going to give you something special – a tiny glimpse into the depths of my mind. Behind this link right here, you’ll find an Excel file that has literally every part of the system – in it’s current form – in a format you can peruse. Honestly, it’s probably no more enlightening than what’s already written in this article. Indeed, I’ve probably mentioned several things in this article that are not stated at all in my working document. But for what it’s worth, you can see how much (or really, how little) I’ve done so far.

Enjoy!

Yours in Adventure,

Shane

]]>http://crackpot.studio/2018/07/20/skirmish-tactical-miniatures/feed/0318Things I Have Learnthttp://crackpot.studio/2018/07/13/things-i-have-learnt/
http://crackpot.studio/2018/07/13/things-i-have-learnt/#respondFri, 13 Jul 2018 09:40:49 +0000http://crackpot.studio/?p=271It’s been a touch over three months since I started this blog, and exactly three months since I committed (in my own mind – I’m not silly enough to make a public promise) to making a blog post every week, whether I have something to say or not. This is not exactly a huge milestone. It’s not like I’ve been going for an entire year, or made it to my 100th entry, but it’s still pretty significant for me. Finding the time to design around work and family is difficult, and it’s even harder to dedicate time to writing about the process. So I thought it would be nice to look back on these three months and highlight just a few of the things I have learnt.

I have learnt that it is really hard to stick to a schedule! Some of these posts I’ve written days – or weeks – in advance, and that’s the only thing that has allowed me to stick to this weekly update schedule. Between family weddings, work busyness, general family craziness and the drudgery of adult responsibilities, it’s damn hard!

I have learnt that when I force myself to write about my projects, it helps me keep a handle on all the different parts of a design. Rather than having flash-in-the-pan ideas, I write them down to either turn them into a future blog post, or simply to work on them in the future.

I have learnt that a palate-cleanser is important now and then. I love writing for d3RPG, but getting projects like HexTerra or Crownfall out and publicly available is a good way to take a break while still being productive.

I have learnt that there is not enough time in the day for play testing. It’s probably the single most important part of game design, and yet Horizons sits on the shelf gathering dust. I have a mostly-weekly social games night with my wife and friends, but we have other games to play, too. And I can only subject them to my whims so often.

I have learnt that even small projects take more time than you expect. HexTerra went through many different iterations before it was usable, and that’s just some static 3D designs.

I have learnt that writing an RPG takes even longer than you think. I was under absolutely no delusion that I’d have a usable product by now, but I’m not even nearly as close as I thought I would be. d3RPG is intended to be “rules lite”, and yet it keeps getting bigger and bigger, and still isn’t ready for even early alpha testing.

I have learnt that self care is really important. Really important. Some weekends I’ve wanted nothing more than to bury myself in my writing, but I’ve realised that I can’t possibly produce anything useful given my mental state, which would just make me feel even worse, so the best thing is to take a couple of days off. Plus – turns out eating right and exercising are kinda important.

I have learnt that community is critical. The Roleplaying Game Developers of Australia and Tabletop Game Designers Australia Facebook groups are full of people, both new (like myself) and super experienced. Every single one of them is helpful, enthusiastic and wants to see others succeed. The tabletop and roleplaying communities are expanding at such a rate that competition is not something that is considered even a remote concern. Instead, everyone feeds of everyone else’s enthusiasm, and we all benefit.

I have learnt that I tend to start designing from themes, rather than mechanics. Horizons started after I wanted an exploration/sailing game. A little while ago I set up the telescope for my son to look at the Moon, I saw a set of constellation-themed dice for sale in a trade group, and I listened to a podcast featuring some Starfinder ship combat. These three events – all on the same day – got me thinking about a spacefaring trading game, with no idea how it would work. But damn do I want to explore space!

Mostly, though, I have learnt that it makes me happy to write these articles. The small amount of feedback I receive is helpful in shaping my thoughts, and lets me know that I’m not spewing these words into a shapeless void never to be heard (or read) by a living being. I can’t pretend that my writing has improved greatly over just three months, but I have gotten a lot – a LOT – more comfortable exposing my thoughts to the world, which is most definitely a good thing, both for me personally, and for my future game designs.

Can I keep up with a post a week? I really don’t know. Sometimes the well starts to run pretty dry. But I’m going to keep trying. It’s been a helpful exercise.

So thank you all for being part of this so far. It’s been great, and I’m sure it’s only going to get better. I wonder what I can learn after an entire year?

Yours in Adventure,

Shane.

]]>http://crackpot.studio/2018/07/13/things-i-have-learnt/feed/0271Painting Terrain – So Easy Even I Can Do It!http://crackpot.studio/2018/07/06/painting-terrain-so-easy-even-i-can-do-it/
http://crackpot.studio/2018/07/06/painting-terrain-so-easy-even-i-can-do-it/#respondFri, 06 Jul 2018 08:45:52 +0000http://crackpot.studio/?p=307Very picture-heavy post this week. I’ve once again been ignoring the design work in front of me while I focus on something with more immediate benefits – painting my Fat Dragon dungeon tiles. Fat Dragon Games has been around for a while, creating printable scenery files. Initially as good old paper-based gear, and more recently (but still for a few years) as 3D-printable designs.

I’ve been printing these Dungeon tiles ever since I got my printer. Indeed, it was the primary reason for the purchase. So I thought it was about time that I got on with it and turned the boring, bare plastic into something that looks a bit more fit-for-purpose. Over the last week I’ve had some time to have a go, so I present to you…

A Talentless Tight-Arse Guide to Painting Terrain – in pictures!

Throughout the post, remember to click/tap on the images for their full-size glory. This is not a full tutorial, as such. That’s much better done on video. Plus, there’s so many tutorials out there that I’m not even going to do you the favour of providing links. Go forth, seek, and ye shall find. Rather, this is just a brief outline to show you the kind of detail you can get for only a little bit of effort – definitely within the realms of an amateur painter (after all, that’s all I am myself!).

First, the finished product. Forgive the nonsensical dungeon layout – I had to make do with the pieces I had finished for the shot. Painting terrain is definitely quicker than painting miniatures, but it still takes a little patience. It’s pretty straightforward though – structures and scenery are a lot more forgiving detail-wise.

I’ve done a few terrain pieces in the past, and found that I was using up my precious Vallejo paints way too quickly. Those things are expensive! So off I trotted to the kid’s craft supplies cupboard and found these few paints. They’re all roughly $2.50 at whatever form of cheap dollar store you have around your area. And they ended up working surprisingly well. A little thicker than the Vallejo paints, but that actually works in our favour when dealing with terrain. We’ll be applying thicker layers here than we would on miniatures, and a thicker consistency of paint lends itself to this.

Firstly, you should probably prime your pieces with a basic primer spray. I did that for these pieces (Rustoleum 2X Grey Primer), but neglected to get a shot of them at the time. Once they’re primed, slap a coat of plain black acrylic all over them. Starting with a black coat allows the deep crevices to look nice and shadowy before we start adding our colours.

Same pieces, different angle. You can see here that there are several different filaments I’ve used (the orange is PETG, the two different greys and the green are all PLA). Compare the colours with the shot above, and you can see that you can very easily hide your base plastic colour with a primer and a base coat.

Once I’d done the base coat, I added a basic grey to all the brickwork – both the walls and the floor. I used a 2:1 white:black mix to get the grey colour I wanted. I used a fairly wet brush for this, but applied it with a traditional dry-brush stroke technique. Do NOT mistake this for actual dry-brushing, though. My brush had waaaaay more paint on it. You want to leave behind a good dab of paint, without actually dropping globs behind you. Each tile only takes about 30-40 seconds. Just a quick lick on each.

Different, slightly closer shot of the same step. The benefit of our dark base coat shows through now. You can already tell the edges of bricks vs shadows in the deep spots.

Oops. Remember how I said not to leave globs of paint behind? If you do, you’ll end up looking like the piece on the right. You can see that I’ve used waaay too much paint here. Never mind – we can hide some of this with additional steps, and what we can’t hide doesn’t really matter. This is all about bang for buck and getting pieces to the table, not winning awards.

Now we want to add some character – pick a few bricks on each piece and paint them in another shade. I used the “burnt umber” from the earlier picture. For the most part, I did 3-4 bricks per wall segment, with curves or corners getting extra.

Next step is more of the same, but with a different colour. You don’t want to make it garish with wildly different tones, so I used a 2:1 white:burnt umber mix to create some lighter bricks. I applied this in about the same proportion – 3 to 4 bricks per piece.

I actually missed taking a photo of the previous step, so the following shot actually has another step included. The highlighted bricks stood out rather well and looked a little out of place, so I applied a very thin layer of white over the walls. This time, it’s much much closer to a dry-brush technique. This top layer helps tie the different colours together and make them belong a bit. The white is obviously going to be a lot brighter than the grey, so you want to be very careful here that you don’t overdo it.

This is where I moved away from the craft paints, and busted out one of my Vallejo pots (72.155 Dark Charcoal) for a quick layer slapped over the floor. This helps separate the floors from the walls, making them a bit darker in comparison. After all, the floors are going to be covered in grime from countless centuries of settling dust and creature’s footprints. They’re not going to be as clean and bright as the walls.

Another shot closer up. You can most definitely see the layers from the printer, but again – this is for table play, not for winning awards. The layer lines on the walls are fine – they kind of fit with the worked-stone construction method of the dungeon bricks. I’m not especially impressed with the floor surface though – it’s very stringy and not especially smooth, but I’ve since observed that this tends to appear on the PETG tiles I’ve printed. It’s still there to some extent on the PLA material, but not nearly so noticeable. Guess I know which material I’ll be using for my tiles going forward.

And there we go! All done! Ten tiles did take me a while (probably 4 hours or so), but I was also learning as I went and taking notes for this article. I’m sure that I’ll be able to reproduce the result with the next 60 tiles I have waiting already, and the roughly 300 more that I need to hurry up and print….

With any luck this will add another layer of immersion to the game when I finally get enough painted and finished. Really can’t wait to get my players through this.

Remember, click the photos for a much larger zoom to check out the details. They’re a very long way from perfect, but I’m really happy with the time/effort/money combination that has gone into it.

]]>http://crackpot.studio/2018/07/06/painting-terrain-so-easy-even-i-can-do-it/feed/0307Fate Accelerated – A Primerhttp://crackpot.studio/2018/06/29/fate-accelerated-a-primer/
http://crackpot.studio/2018/06/29/fate-accelerated-a-primer/#respondFri, 29 Jun 2018 09:08:43 +0000http://crackpot.studio/?p=263Last week, I briefly mentioned that I got a few members of our RPG group together to test out the Breakfast Cult setting for the Fate Accelerated system. I said that I had a few thoughts to share, and so here we are. It turns out, however, that I can’t really critique the game based on one session using a specific setting. So although I offer some thoughts towards the end, this article is more of a “Fate Accelerated Primer”.

(Some of you who are familiar with the system might note the lowercase “Fate”, instead of the fairly common capitalised “FATE”. In my research for this article, it turns out that the lowercase has been the “correct” format since at least 2015. As a result, this is how I’ll be trying to refer to it from here on.)

Settings? Systems? What…?

First, let’s take half a step backwards. If you don’t routinely play RPGs, you might be a bit confused between a system (or rule-set) and a setting. This is only fair. Let’s break it down a little bit:

A system or rule-set is the set of rules (get it?) governing how the game works.

A setting (often called a Campaign Setting) is the place in which the characters of the game find themselves.

A good example of this is Savage Worlds – a group of players could find themselves exploring space, delving into ancient tombs, hacking and slashing their way through an Orc horde, or investigating a murder in the Wild West. All these different types of games can be played using the same system (or rule-set), making it relatively easy for a single group to move between different genres without having to learn a whole new way of playing every time. In fact, Savage Worlds is the system used by a large number of individual settings.

So… Fate?

Indeed, this is the same setup used by Fate Core and Fate Accelerated (Accelerated is a much simpler and more streamlined – although this doesn’t make it objectively better – version of Core). Either of these systems can be used in a variety of published settings (provided worlds and adventures), or homebrew games (where you create your own world and story).

Breakfast Cult is a setting that utilises Fate Accelerated. Have you ever wanted to solve mysteries involving Lovecraftian Elder Gods (y’know – Cthulhu and his buddies)? What about in a High School? On an island in the middle of the ocean? 100 years in the future? Where the occult is a recognised and vaguely-respected science? With a bit of an Anime flavour layered over the top?

You want ALL of those things…? Well, have I got a setting for you! Welcome to Breakfast Cult!

It’s a bit a niche area of interest, I’ll grant you that. It’s not really my personal area of interest, and Fate Accelerated is/was a new system to everyone in the group as well. This makes writing this article a bit tricky – what I’m trying to do is write about Fate Accelerated, not Breakfast Cult, but it’s awfully difficult to talk about one in isolation of the other. But I’ll do my best.

How does Fate work?

I’m going to take a massive axe to an already slimmed-down system, and summarise the core of Fate in two sentences:

State what you want your character to do and how you want to do it, and roll four special dice to see if it works. Justify how this action is helped or hindered by your character's Aspects for a bonus.

And that’s really it. Aficionados of the system will want to flay me in exchange for my butchering of the system, and they’re welcome to. However, try to keep in mind this is an article for people with no experience, written by a guy with only a few hours experience.

Anyway, there’s four key parts of those sentences that I really want to focus on: the dice, how you act, your Aspects, and the bonuses.

The Dice

I mentioned these dice last week, but the general idea is that you have four dice with three different faces: two pluses, two minuses and two blanks. You roll these four dice and sum the totals, ending up with a result between -4 and +4. Pretty simple stuff.

Approaches

This is the official term for how you act. There are six approaches available: Careful, Clever, Flashy, Forceful, Quick, and Sneaky.

Couple of quick examples: You could try to Flashily distract the guards at the door, but there’s not much point trying to Forcefully do it – they’ll probably figure out something is up. When they do leave their post though, you might try Forcefully kicking the door in. Trying to Quickly open the door though isn’t going to help if it’s locked.

Every character has varying bonuses (from +0 to +3) to each of the Approaches. This means that some characters are naturally going to be better at some things than others, but everyone can try to do anything anyway.

Aspects

Aspects help to define who your character is. Depending on the type of game you’re playing you might have a different number of aspects, but there’s generally between 3 and 6 per character.

An aspect is a short phrase, and is very specific to the setting in which you’re playing. “Best Pilot on Mars” is an awesome Aspect, but it would be utterly useless in Breakfast Cult, where Mars (or even Piloting any kind of ship) is not really relevant. “Captain of the Swim Team” would work better for Breakfast Cult (after all, it’s set in a school), but it’s not very helpful if you’re playing a Medieval Fantasy game.

There’s no set list of Aspects to pick from – it’s entirely up to the players to define their own to suit the characters and the game they’re playing in.

You should also try to pick Aspects that have a potential downside, as well. This is super helpful when we discuss the bonuses that you get for spending your Fate points.

Fate Points

Yes, the feature that lends it’s name to the game. Or does the game lend it’s name to this feature…? Never mind. Either way, Fate Points are most certainly a central aspect of the Fate Accelerated system.

You start the session (generally) with three Fate points, and can spend them throughout the game to gain various bonuses by Invoking your aspects. Further, you can earn more points by having your aspects Compelled.

Invoking and Compelling are two sides to the same coin – you will generally Invoke your own aspects to help yourself out, and the Game Master will Compel your aspects to hinder you in some way (of course it’s a lot more complicated than that, but that’s clear enough for now).

The bonuses you can get include:

+2 to the roll. Simple and straight forward. “I invoke my aspect ‘Keen Sense of Smell’ to help track the intruder”

Reroll the dice. Also simple. No invoking or compelling necessary here – just spend one of your Fate points.

Confront an opponent to increase the difficulty of their task. Slightly more complicated. “The salivating dire wolf is ‘Ravenously Hungry’, so it’s more attracted to the deer he’s already caught than to me”

Help someone else in their task. Fairly easy. “Because I’m a ‘Wanna-be Librarian’, I’ll help Josie with her research”

Of course, there’s a lot more to the system as a whole, but those four key areas should give you enough information to know whether it’s something of interest to you.

Personal Thoughts

This is where it gets hard, trying to separate my thoughts on Breakfast Cult, from FATE Accelerated more generally. Because it turns out, I found it really hard to help my player’s Invoke their Aspects when we’re playing in a setting I’m not really familiar with. I don’t go in big for Anime, Future settings aren’t really my favoured terrain, it’s many years since I was in high school, Lovecraft and the Elder Gods are things I’m only marginally familiar with…

…But what’s awesome is that none of that affected how much fun we had. Don’t get me wrong at all – Breakfast Cult is a very detailed, well thought out and fascinating setting – it’s just not one that I personally found easy to work with.

I’m confident, though, that if we were playing a more traditional Dungeons & Dragons/Pathfinder type setting, that it would have been much easier to work with the various parts of the system – especially Aspects.

Here’s a few examples of Aspects taken at random from the pre-generated characters in Breakfast Cult:

Only Cares About His Hair

Self Described Star Footballsman

Cybernetics Are, Like, Cool And Yeah

Goddamn, I Hate Magic

And that’s not even the weird stuff dealing with the Occult… Working in the type of setting I’m used to playing in, though, allows me to come up with Aspects almost off-the-cuff:

Master of Undeath

Best Swordsman in the Kingdom

Strange Connection to Animals

No Lock Can Keep Me Out

Some of these are horribly cliched, but that’s half the fun. A system like Fate Accelerated could be nearly perfect for “pick up and play” games, with none of the complicated prep-work of more traditional RPGs. As long as everyone involved is well-versed in the world you’re playing in, and this is where we fell afoul of Breakfast Cult. It was just too alien to us as individuals as a setting.

But would I try again? I sure as heck would! Fate Accelerated is fun!

If you’re interested in trying it for yourself, check the links above. It’s actually free, but I’m not going to hand it to you on a silver platter – go check out the Evil Hat Games website and find it for yourself!

And if you’re a fan of Fate Accelerated, let me know. I’d love to know the types of games you’re playing yourself.

Yours in Adventure,

Shane.

]]>http://crackpot.studio/2018/06/29/fate-accelerated-a-primer/feed/0263Putting a Little Sparkle in the Gamehttp://crackpot.studio/2018/06/22/putting-a-little-sparkle-in-the-game/
http://crackpot.studio/2018/06/22/putting-a-little-sparkle-in-the-game/#respondFri, 22 Jun 2018 09:47:15 +0000http://crackpot.studio/?p=261As part of the Mother’s Day haul a few weeks ago, I bought my wife a set of Unicorn Dice from The Dice Shop Online. They were a big hit! Except that we didn’t have any gaming sessions planned any time soon so she wasn’t going to get a chance to use them.

At around the same time I received my copy of Breakfast Cult, a FATE Accelerated-based game. I suggested give it a go, and my wife decided she was only going to play if she got to use her sparkly new dice. Trouble is, FATE is not a d20-based system. Instead, it uses Fudge Dice – 6-sixed dice with 2x plus, 2x minus, and 2x blank. (I have some thoughts on the FATE Accelerated system, but they’re for another day. Perhaps next week.)

So, what was I to do? I really want to get more people playing a wider variety of games – if nothing else, it makes for great research while I work on d3RPG. And I certainly didn’t want to leave my perpetually-suffering gamer-buddy (aka – my wife) out in the cold.

And so I did what any self-respecting 3d-printing geek would do – I printed some! The basic step-by-step I used was:

Created a simple cube in Fusion 360 and chamfered the edges

Exported the cube for further work in Microsoft 3D Builder (much easier to use, but far less options – including chamfering…)

Arranged the icons on the relevant sides of the cube, and used the “subtract” tool to inset the icons, like a regular carved die.

Voila! A Unicorn-themed FATE/Fudge dice!

And to complete the themeing, I of course needed several different colours. A set of FATE dice requires four pieces, and I only had three colours of filament. What else was I supposed to do, except order a fourth?

The print on a couple of them didn’t turn out perfectly, but it was good enough for playing a one-shot. And the look on her face when she received them was awesome!